Physics II For Dummies is for the inquiring mind. It’s meant to explain hundreds of phenomena that you can observe all around you. For example, how does polarized light really work? Was Einstein really right about time dilation at high speeds? Why do the electromagnets in electric motors generate magnetism? And if someone hands you a gram of radioactive material with a halflife of 22,000 years, should you panic?

To study physics is to study the world. Your world. That’s the kind of perspective I take in this book. Here, I try to relate physics to your life, not the other way around. So in the upcoming chapters, you see how telescopes and microscopes work, and you find out what makes a properly cut diamond so brilliant. You discover how radio antennas pick up signals and how magnets make motors run. You see just how fast light and sound can travel, and you get an idea of what it really means for something to go radioactive.

When you understand the concepts, you see that the math in physics isn’t just a parade of dreadful word problems; it’s a way to tie real-world measurements to all that theory. Rest assured that I’ve kept the math in this book relatively simple — the equations don’t require any knowledge beyond algebra and trigonometry.

Physics II For Dummies picks up where a Physics I course leaves off — after covering laws of motion, forces, energy, and thermodynamics. Physics I and Physics II classes have some overlap, so you do find info on electricity and magnetism in both this book and in Physics For Dummies. But in Physics II For Dummies, I cover these topics in more depth. A great thing about this book is that you decide where to start and what to read. It’s a reference you can jump into and out of at will. Just head to the table of contents or the index to find the information you want.